When I worked at a supermarket, I had to train a 17 year old girl on her first day.

While we were putting out the ready meals, I tried to break the ice with some casual small talk: "Do you prefer Chinese or Indian food?"

Big mistake.

She immediately launched into a foul mouthed rant full of slurs about how much she hated Indian people. When I cut her off and explained how completely out of line and racist she was being, she just shrugged and said:

"You shouldn't have asked if you didn't want to hear the truth."

Safe to say, her supermarket career ended almost as soon as it started.

I work in a little record shop in Leeds and had someone come in today, hum three notes at me, and ask if I could tell them the song. Not the artist. The song. From the humming.

Told them I would need a bit more to go on, and they looked at me like I had personally let them down.

It got me thinking that every retail job must have its own version of this. The one request that comes in so often, or is so absurd, that a small part of you quietly leaves your body every time it happens.

So go on. What is the one that broke you.

I had a slightly bizarre conversation with my neighbour this morning while we were both out the front of our houses.

The hosepipe ban came up, and she said that if she saw anyone on the street using a hosepipe, she'd call the police. I genuinely thought she was joking, but she was completely serious and said people need to be held accountable.

It got me thinking less about the ban itself and more about the etiquette of it all.

If you saw a neighbour using a hosepipe during a ban, would you actually confront them or report them? Or would you just assume they might have an exemption, be using a different water source, or simply mind your own business?

It feels like there's a line between wanting people to follow the rules and actively policing your neighbours. I'm curious where most people think that line is.

I'm a videographer and I had a shoot today for a carehome. The carehome itself is nice but disturbingly had an African Grey Parrot in a standing cage which acts as a communal pet.

The cage for a bird like that quite frankly seemed tiny to me (any cage for a bird is awful imo as they should be free roaming) and it was faiely evident that they do not take the bird out much based on the fact that he had a lot of feathers missing presumably from boredom/stress. There was no stimulation for them either, no toys only a cardboard box on the floor of his cage.

I think this is pretty sad because this is a pet owned as a business, and not with an owner who would reguarly interact with the bird.​

Genuinely not sure if it does violate any rights or if this is allowed, but it's quite disturbing to me.

I’m a guy, and this happened this morning in my apartment/residential building gym.

I was in the middle of my bench press workout. There were multiple empty benches in the gym. I got up briefly between sets, and a woman walked in carrying a tripod, camera/phone and other equipment. Instead of using one of the empty benches, she put all of her stuff on the bench I was actively using.

I said, “I’m using that bench.”

She replied, quite rudely, “I’m just using this bench to set up my stuff, OKAY?” The way she said “okay” came across as if I’d done something wrong by pointing out I was using it.

She then set the tripod up immediately next to my bench and started recording herself. It was so close that I genuinely had to be careful during my next bench press set because the dumbbell could have hit the tripod. Rather than risk damaging her equipment or having an awkward confrontation, I gave up and moved to another empty bench.

What frustrated me wasn’t just the tripod—it was the attitude and the assumption that I’d simply accommodate her. I also felt a bit stuck because I’m a man. If this had been another guy, I probably would have just said, “Mate, can you move that? It’s in the way,” and had a normal conversation. But with a woman, I was worried that if the interaction escalated, it could easily be perceived differently, so I just walked away.

Am I overthinking this, or would this annoy you too?

What would you have done in my situation?

Don’t get me wrong, I love my friends and family, and I am happy for them…but is anyone else just over weddings in their current state? They’re so bleeding expensive as a guest, and also for the couples wedding married.

Abroad weddings cost an absolute bomb as a guest. Even when they’re in the UK they’re often in the middle of nowhere requiring a couple of nights in a hotel + taxis which often totals over £200 a head. Plus the cost of getting there and a new outfit that has to be in a particular, as often restrictive, dress code. Everything feels like it’s just for TikTok and Instagram. Same trends, same speeches, same staged group shots. What happened to little local weddings, ceremony in the local church and then reception in a small local hotel? £100 expectation for a gift after spending over £500 already, multiple times a year is a big ask.

Don’t get me started on stags and hen dos. All abroad, all expensive, multiple for one person. It is just too much! When I’ve said I can’t go because I can’t afford £500+ I get told I’m a bad friend?!

* Not American. Sorry I didn’t know gotten wasn’t correct.

I recently went to Alton towers with the kids and their grandparents.

We got them fast passes so they could make the most of the day, it's something we usually do when we go to the Orlando theme parks, it just makes it a much more enjoyable experience.

But their grandparents were aghast. The idea that we would pay so they could skip the queue seemed to really bother them, they said it was teaching them poor values, that they'll think they're better than everyone else and it is a waste of money.

My view is that I was just paying for a product.

What do people think about them ?

Right UKers, I'm Dutch but I fucking love your cheese. I've just arrived back in the UK for the first time in a while to visit some friends, and before I left the Netherlands a sacrilegious French colleague of mine ridiculed the idea that British or Dutch cheese even remotely compares to French cheese, and that the French have all the best stuff. I strongly contested this idea, and have agreed that in two weeks we are going to do a blind taste testing of all three to determine the best. I have the Dutch and French cheeses sourced from friends on the continent, but I'm going to need to source the UK stuff myself this week.

I need your help. I'm going to be in North Kent, Bedfordshire / Hertfordshire border, and Portsmouth this week. I need cheeses I'll be able to source easily from around those places, but I'm willing to venture away from supermarkets to get the really good stuff.

So, what's your best recommendations? Style, and goat/cow/sheep doesn't matter, as long as it helps put a naiive Frenchie in her place!

Thank you in advance for your help!

Hello!

I'm British-Turkish and my wife is Japanese. We met in Osaka when I was there for academic research and hit it off, she now lives over here with me and we’re expecting our daughter, Ayaha, in August!

My wife is very insistent on her learning Japanese, which I'm obviously on board with, whilst I would like to teach her Turkish or Gagauz, as they are my heritage languages.

However, deep down, I’ve been a bit worried about school life for our child. English is obviously what we'd like her to use in an educational environment to interact with people, but we're also concerned that this will detract from her ability to fully learn her parents' languages. Does anyone have experience with this?

I’ve never really understood why, two and a half men was aired in the UK. When Charlie Sheen was still the main actor, it just seemed like it was on tv 24/7, like back to back episodes all day.

The comedy for me at least, just didn’t work. I mean why would it? It’s a US show aired in the UK. It was just this cheesy carryon. But I guess someone must of enjoyed it, otherwise why was it even aired in the UK.

Late night US talk shows are another one. I just don’t find any of the content giving “laugh out loud” vibes for a British Audience.

Any other US Shows aired in the UK that just make you think, WTF?

I'm 25, and I have realised I possess little life skills. I can hold down a soft skills based job, but other than that I don't think I have many life skills.

Cooking very limited

Gardening basically inexistent and I am having trouble with it.

Cleaning a house, omg do I struggle.

Sticking to a budget and not being impulsive spender, basically non existent.

For context, I grew up in a single parent household. My mum was busy with work and school. My dad was a lazy bum. I would spend every waking hour of the day gaming when not school, until I reached about 16-17 and started going outside the house.

Then COVID hit.

I have a few British family friends and whenever I talk to them, they're always so much funnier on average than the people in my home country. Plus, I find British sitcoms and comedies way funnier than the ones here too. Scots are especially hilarious, I always find myself laughing when speaking to the few I know. Is it just because I'm not used to British humor, or is there something specific to the UK?

I swear I am not making this up. In my High School (Staffordshire area), if you had one of those blue asthma inhalers, people would ALWAYS ask you to give them an inhaler burn. This was done by holding it right down up against their wrist, and then spraying it as many times as they could withstand.

The resulting (let's not beat around the bush here) chemical burn was then paraded around the school as evidence of how hard you were. I would get asked maybe like once or twice a month by anyone who saw me using the inhaler if I could give them an inhaler burn. Even then, it struck me as kind of stupid, so I only obliged their request a few times. It was like some sort of ritual scarification.

I brought this up to my mates and they thought I was doing a bit. Did this happen anywhere else?

For me it's the seatbelt sensor, anything heavy on the passengers seat and my car has a bitch fit that I have a passenger without a seat belt. For context I can't turn this off so just annoys the hell out of me.

Edit: I'm fully aware how a seatbelt works and appreciate the advice on how to put this in. It's just not every time and usually when I'm a mile down the road. Additional context, it's the same noise as my tyre pressure warning and any other issue!

Currently sitting waiting for a delayed CrossCountry service (shock!).

My partner and I disagree on this - in their opinion, the refund should go to your employer as they paid for the ticket. In mine, it's my time that's been wasted, so it should go to me personally.

What does everyone else think?

I'm unfortunate enough to have to travel long distances for work with CrossCountry regularly, and am intimately acquainted with their Delay Repay webpage. Needless to say, they've paid for my lunch a fair few times!

Edit: I am salaried, do not get overtime nor formal TOIL - although my manager does give some flexibility, it's not formal policy. Generally the travel leads to very long days (getting home at 8pm tonight after a 6:30am train yesterday morning) and the tickets are paid for directly by my employer. The expenses policy says nothing on the matter also.

Based on the responses, I think my position is vindicated and I shall claim moral victory, but to keep the peace I shan't be revisiting this particular conversation 😂 Thanks all, have been enjoying this when the train WiFi was working (not well or often)!

Mine would be that I actually enjoy going to bed early now. Younger me would have thought I was boring.

Is there an unspoken time allowance/limit before all the flowers and plastic wrapping and toys and offerings are discarded?

So today, I drove a fair way and bought a new kayak and went to a nearby canal to try it.

As I was about to launch next to some locks a narrowboat pulled up on the other bank. It was a normal sized narrowboat not the little half length ones you see sometimes. And it soon became apparent it was just a couple of I dare say retired people from the USA. I'll call them hubby and wife, I don't know that for a fact.

Hubby was driving, wife had to jump off and tie up, then go look at the lock. First thing I noticed was she didn't have the key (I last used a powered boat on canals 30+ years ago with scouts, I remember the basics but can't remember what they're properly called). So I shouted over you need the key, and crossed over to see if I could help.

After a brief chat it was established they'd just arrived in the UK today, this was their first lock and they didn't know what to do. So I found a spindle, said "put the key on that, turn it and it'll open the sluice gate so water comes into the lock to raise the level", then I took the key and opened one on the other side.

Eventually some CRT guys turned up and pointed out the other sluices we should've opened (the canals I'm used to only had one per side), I figured that was the end of my usefulness, so wished them a good holiday and went back to my kayak.

But I worry how much they're going to enjoy it? it was great when we had a team of 12 boy scouts ready to jump into action at every lock. When it's just 2 quite frail elderly people who haven't even been shown what to do I can't imagine it being much fun. Seems like something that should have been covered at the hire place?

They're on the Grand Union heading North from Leighton Buzzard area, just hope there's plenty of manned locks for them!

I graduated around 2013 while I earn good money now I didn’t really start my career properly until 2018 due to doing a masters and taking some time off in between. I still owe around £10k 😬

There’s no real published data out there of those who have/haven’t paid it off and what their balances currently look like like so I thought I’d ask here

(I sincerely apologise for how fucked over those under Plan 2 etc are and their loans balances)

Still ruing over England's loss to Argentina just over a week ago at the WC, that instant feeling you get that this time isn't gonna be the one (it never is). Feel like I always take it way too seriously.

Got me thinking. What's the most personally disappointed you've felt after a sporting loss? Could be related to the UK, England, or any of the other brilliant nations and regions that make up our diverse sporting culture.

On balance, mine's probably the 2019 rugby World Cup final. I had to duck out for something and missed the whole second half, so I was frantically refreshing the live score on RugbyPass hoping the last update was wrong, and South Africa just kept pulling away. Beat the All Blacks in the semi and I'd convinced myself it was written, it was not...

I feel like Americans have always been claiming their ancestry from Scotland/Ireland, German too, but ashamed to say English. Suddenly there is rise in wanting to be from these countries, especially Norwegian because of the World Cup,

I was speaking to a friend of mine and we were talking about dinner. I mentioned that me, my wife and my kids all eat dinner at the same time and we eat the same meal. My friend said that his kids eat before them, then him and his wife eat dinner once the kids go to bed. But I've noticed that it seems to be more common these days for kids to eat separately from their parents, and I've always found that really odd. If both parents are home at a reasonable time, surely a family dinner is more convenient for everybody?

Obviously some people work late and need to eat dinner later than their family. But for people who finish work at a reasonable time and are home for when their kids eat dinner...why don't you guys have a family dinner? By the way, this isn't me judging people, I am genuinely just curious because it just sounds like more effort to me to have separate dinner times when everybody could be home for a family dinner. Cooking twice sounds exhausting 😭

Personally mine would be the cadburys dream bar, or the walkers BBQ.